


Mini-mart Sweetheart

by poisson (hotarumyst)



Category: Tales of Berseria
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Tales of Zestiria, Backstory, Character Study, Dating, Domestic, F/F, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-29
Updated: 2017-04-29
Packaged: 2018-10-25 11:33:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10763406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hotarumyst/pseuds/poisson
Summary: Magilou meets Velvet for the first time at the job-posting bulletin board in the slums of Ladylake. It's a wonder that Velvet herself never changes when she's defined by her undeniable influence on the people around her.





	Mini-mart Sweetheart

Meeting Velvet was wild.

Meeting Velvet was an experience that wouldn’t have been the same if every piece hadn't meticulously fallen into place. Of course, Magilou and Velvet were the ones building the puzzle, but feelings were unpredictable and so was Magilou. Meeting Velvet was something that could never have happened quite the same way twice. 

They met at the bulletin board right by the market Magilou picked up groceries from. Magilou was boarding with a nice old lady who conveniently forgot that Magilou never paid rent as long as she went out and bought groceries and kept the condo relatively clean. 

Velvet was just out of school (read: 22 or so) and working as a delivery person, and Magilou had trouble holding down any sort of job. She had just been finishing up a stint as a hostess at a local tavern, which, admittedly, was her longest run yet. She was only fired when the manager finally ( _finally!_ ) caught her carving old, made up witch chants into the podium during off-hours. They actually up and tossed the podium out with her because they thought she'd cursed them with the daemonblight or something. Good, because she didn't like that job anyway.

The bulletin was the best place to find job listings, and Magilou was a regular there. She met Velvet reaching for the last tab left sticking out the bottom of an old handwritten piece of parchment: _nanny wanted ASAP_.

If Magilou were the wind, Velvet was a stubborn tree that refused to be uprooted. If Magilou were a sailboat, Velvet was the anchor left over from some abandoned cargo ship holding her in place. When their hands touched, they jerked and looked at each other like the other was the last person anyone would expect to be a babysitter.

First of all, the only thing about Velvet that was in one piece was her hair. The rest of her getup looked like she'd just been mauled by a panther. 

Magilou really had no right to speak with the whole circus troupe situation that was going on with her aesthetic lately, but at least it was coherent. She’d been pretty particular about curating it, and there was an odd sense of pride about wearing something that was so undeniably _loud_. Everyone at the market knew her, which was why she had no trouble landing jobs every time she fucked up and got fired for whatever reason. Her outfit was therefore… utilitarian. Velvet’s was not.

"I hope you're not interviewing in that," Magilou said offhandedly, giving Velvet an obvious once-over. It was a barely concealed excuse to ogle her body, which looked fit: curved yet hard at the same time. Admirable. Not really Magilou’s aesthetic. Something she could never achieve. Maybe that was why it looked so irresistible right then— you always hate the part of yourself you see in others, and you always want what you can’t have.

Velvet, on the other hand, focused her gaze just on Magilou’s face. "Likewise," she said after a moment. It wasn't that Magilou was afraid to meet her eye to eye, there was just so much to take in that she hadn't quite gotten there yet. And Velvet’s eyes did not disappoint; under that condescending glare was something undeniably playful. Velvet seemed like the reactive type, but at least she was upfront about her emotions. She felt like someone you could get to know just by looking at her— you didn't have to dig deep— but there was so much of her to know that you'd never get bored. Magilou shot her a brazen smirk, and Velvet nodded in reply, the side of her mouth quirking up as well into something resembling amusement.

"You can have the last slip," Magilou said, rocking back and forth on her feet with a grin. "I have a good memory." She tapped her temple and gave Velvet a deep kind of look.

Velvet shrugged. "Sure," she said. This was an interesting one.

—

The only place in town that gave Magilou the heebie-jeebies was the nobles’ quarters. She could deal with every last rat in the slums who tried to flip up her skirt or pull on her hair or otherwise rob her or invade her personal space. In the more respectable common side of town, merchants and shopkeepers were the easiest of the lot. Just ruffle their feathers a bit and they suddenly couldn’t tell their foot from the back of their hand. There were dogs, children, innkeepers, priests, knights; everyone mingled and no one paid one another the least bit of respect. At least they all got equal treatment.

The thing about the nobles’ quarters was that eerie quietness that pervaded even the manors and lawns, lined with perfectly spaced flowers and de-thorned rose bushes. The nobles were always so hesitant to look her way, as if it were a show of honorability or self-control to avoid something that caught your attention. There were always more pretenses the higher you thought of yourself, and the nobles were as high as that innkeeper at the corner who stunk the whole street up with the smell of burning herb. Between the two, though, herb reeked far less than entitlement.

The girl who was _supposed_ to be babysitting the child had suddenly been drafted, so she was looking for someone to fill in for her. Magilou just happened to show up at the time of Velvet's interview. It wasn't like she had much better to waste her time doing.

"Fancy meeting you here," Magilou called just as Velvet was raising her hand to knock.

If Velvet was surprised, she didn't show it. Her thick mass of hair was in a long braid today, sticking out of the nest on the top of her head like a broomstick. Her attire was a little more presentable, though, brown and plain and trustworthy-looking. "I take it you have nothing better to do than follow me here," Velvet said. Her voice was once again firm and sure of herself.

Magilou laughed lightly. "You would be correct," she said. "Though it doesn't take a genius to figure out we're both out of a job."

"Actually, I work at the port delivering shipments and scaling fish," said Velvet, motioning with her thumb over her shoulder. "I was just looking to pick up a little extra."

Magilou hummed. "You should be careful how much information you give out about yourself," she said.

"You had no problem following me here, so I figured if you wanted me dead you would've done so already," Velvet pointed out.

"You got me there," said Magilou with a pleased little whine.

"Noisy," commented Velvet.

"Does it bother you?" Magilou said with a grin.

"Not in the slightest," Velvet replied, and Magilou faked disappointment.

Neither of them got the job. It was probably for the better, too. It ended up going to some goody-two-shoes knight lady who just happened to be passing by the area for an afternoon. It was all well, because Magilou’s stomach growled embarrassingly after an unsuccessful interview during which Magilou may or may not have mentioned Velvets breasts more than once or twice. Complaining again about noise, Velvet dragged Magilou's pasty ass out of that posh neighborhood into some rowdy pub that looked like it served large portions. 

"I don’t have money on me," Magilou commented after the fact, finishing off her gratin with a habitual finesse you wouldn’t expect from someone who was more or less living in the slums of a medium-sized town. Velvet watched her the whole time, looking thoughtful, and when Magilou mentioned her money situation, Velvet, once again, didn’t look surprised. 

"You owe me one, then," she said, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, as if they didn’t meet for the first time just a few days ago and were old childhood friends keeping tabs on ongoing wagers.

Magilou grinned to herself, but Velvet caught it. No matter, it was a grin partly intended for her, too. "So we’re making an occasion out of this."

Velvet leaned back and crossed her arms. "I have to collect my collateral, don’t I?" she said, staring straight at Magilou. "If you don’t show up, I’ll have you arrested for extortion."

No matter how sullen Velvet looked 90% of the time, Magilou knew a joke when she heard one. "Are you blackmailing me into going on a date with you?"

"What if I am?"

Magilou made a happy, high-pitched noise again out of the back of her throat. "I’d say with your looks, you don’t have to, really."

"Good," Velvet said, swinging her legs uncrossed and leaning over the table. "Time and place. Or send a sylphjay."

Magilou whistled. "If you think I can afford one of those puppies, you have another thing coming."

"Good, then we’re on the same page," said Velvet. 

Magilou grinned and suggested a picnic out on the hillside.

—

Magilou found out she could cook up a mean _scup_. Scup, by definition, was a mixture of all the leftovers from a week of camping in the woods, thrown into a cauldron and fried at a good 400 with a dash of salt and a bit of garlic powder. Hell, you could even throw the remains of that blueberry pie you spit on to keep the rest of your friends’ grubby little hands off of it, but you definitely saw Bienfu "accidentally" drop it on the ground last night. 

That was pretty much all Magilou had to offer for their unofficial picnic date. Velvet didn’t look like the type to cook either, so Magilou stopped by the market with her last 100 gald and picked up a bottle of shitty wine, called it a day, and had zero sense of guilt about it. They could lie on each others' grumbling stomachs and complain about the patriarchy or something. Magilou had prepared herself for every worst possible outcome. After all, sometimes you just couldn’t compare bad with bad— everything was the same degree of bad, there were just different types of it.

What Magilou hadn’t prepared for, of course, was that Velvet might just be a genius chef. Okay, so Magilou embarrassing herself again was some sort of bad, but not anything intolerable. After all, shame implied that you cared, and Magilou gave caring up a long time ago. She had, effectively, no shame. 

So Velvet cooked them a meal—gratis, too. Who was the real winner here? If Velvet wanted something in return, she’d ask for it; she seemed like the candid type. The type to have some inherent disdain for people like Magilou, but for whatever reason, she agreed to meet her here today on Falkewin Hillside with a nice rainbow quiche, delicately made and presented without pretense. 

Magilou had no such impressive getup— she washed her clothes every few days and hung them up to dry and slept naked. She had a feeling Velvet already knew this, but it somehow couldn’t fully register that Velvet tagged along not to get something out of her but simply for enjoyment of her company. 

"Hey," Velvet said, and Magilou croaked out a noise of acknowledgment. "Nice weather."

"Nice small talk," Magilou replied, and Velvet sighed, sitting down next to her. 

"I figured you wouldn’t spill if I just straight up asked what you were doing all out on your own, hitting it up with a girl from the fish market," said Velvet, and Magilou huffed, framed by a sarcastic grin.

"You're probably right, but now I feel obligated to tell you my entire life story— _precisely_ because you expected me not to," Magilou replied. She drummed her fingers on her chin and smiled. "But that would be playing right into your hands, wouldn’t it?"

"Okay, you got me," Velvet said with a ghost of a grin on her lips. She looked somewhere between dead serious and frightfully coy.

"Let’s just say I ran away from home," Magilou said, and Velvet shrugged.

"We can go with that."

"You’re not curious?" pressed Magilou.

Velvet glanced at her noncommittally while smoothing out the blanket beneath them. "Not very. It doesn’t make a difference to me where you come from." When Magilou eyed her expectantly, Velvet sighed and said, "If you want to spill, spill. I’m curious, but I’ll wait."

It wasn’t that Magilou hadn’t met plenty of people in her life, because she sure had. All different kinds of people, too, who warped the way she viewed the world so early on in life that some things just couldn’t be un-believed, no matter how much she wanted to. The best lies were ones that were laced with a thread of truth; she _had_ run away from home, not with the willing consent of her parents, but then that wouldn’t be running away from home, would it? Not that she could be assed to give a flying fuck, not with the way they treated her, or rather neglected to treat her, for the entirety of her formative years. That probably explained most of why she didn’t "form" quite… right. 

Magilou was usually described as "too much." A single class act, cheap thrills. Like she was fun the first time but tedious to have to keep up with after that, like working in an amusement park or on a cruise ship: you grew tired of it and started hating fun and laughter in general, because it always reminded you of work. It was soul-sucking. Imagine how it felt _being_ The Great Magilou then, she wanted to scream. 

Being liked for enjoyment of her company was unfamiliar— foreign, even. Magilou was not an enjoyable person; she derived a lot of enjoyment, maybe, but one generally didn’t enjoy being around her for extended periods of time. The only way to keep people coming back for more was to hold onto something they wanted, or at least pretend to do so. It became habit, keeping people on their toes, hiding bits and pieces of yourself in compartments for them to open and find when you permitted it so, acting like you where holding some important information hostage. And if they wanted you, all the better. That was all you could do when you were a person who in reality had nothing. 

"Surely that’s not how you treat someone you just met!" Magilou exclaimed, bringing her hand to her chest.

"Oh?" said Velvet flatly. "Tell me how I should be acting, then."

Magilou hummed. "Velvet, my dear," she said, rubbing her chin in dramatic contemplation. "Why, you should want to know as much about me as possible, of course."

"And why is that?" Velvet said, seeming interested only now, as if she couldn’t fathom why in the world tricking information out of people would be important.

"Because what if I were to go traipsing off right this minute, never to return?" Magilou replied coyly. "You wouldn’t know anything about me, hm?"

Velvet flattened out the blanket, rolling her shoulders. "And I wouldn’t care to."

Magilou went quiet at that, scrunching her nose up to hide a blank stare. 

"Listen, if you’re in my life, I’ll get to know you. If you aren’t, I don’t _care_ to know you," Velvet said. "Now eat, the food is getting cold."

The thing about Velvet was that every move of hers was unpredictable yet made so much sense. Every little piece of herself she revealed fit so snugly into the puzzle that was Velvet Crowe, yet wasn’t something you could ever have guessed without her guidance. It was just so satisfying being around Velvet that if she were part of some elaborate trap to capture and torture and kill Magilou, Magilou just might be okay with dying in Velvet’s company. It was almost okay being vulnerable around Velvet, because in all the years Magilou spent wandering around and caging herself off out of some weird primal need for self-preservation, nothing felt nearly as fulfilling as this.

They were just finishing off the wine, 750mL between the two of them, when a groan from the forest behind them interrupted them. The grace with which Velvet jumped up to her feet was only beautiful because of how functional it was and how so very Velvet-like, again, that seemed. So she could fight, so she had reflexes. It was all so sensible, yet not what you would expect of the girl from the fish market looking for a babysitting job. There was a man in the clearing, bloodied and blank-eyed and trembling, holding a kind of bludgeon in his hand. 

"Must be the daemonblight," Velvet muttered. "Almost forgot we’re outside the city."

"Protect me," Magilou whined as she collapsed onto her back, full and uncomfortable and not ready to deal with this right now. Not that she didn’t have a little power of her own, but with Bienfu off running odd-jobs in the streets, she’d probably have a hard time holding her own if the guy had gone full savage. 

Velvet, apparently, was full of surprises. A knife slid out of her right bracelet, and she plunged it deftly into the man’s left chest as he ran toward them, berserk.

Little known fact: Magilou didn’t really have the stomach for murder and all that. There was a point in her life where being as soft as she inherently was inside became absolutely intolerable, but if it weren’t for that, she would never have run from home in the first place and met Bienfu and Velvet and the old lady landlord and seen all the wonderful, amusing things the world had to offer. So things generally turned out all right, but it was a truth she’d never admit. Yeah, she was a lazy bitch and she despised the rigorous training in Pendrago, but deep down, it was the killing that really drove her to leave, and maybe only she and Melchior alone in the world knew that. And Magilou couldn’t care less if old man Melchior went and blabbed about how Magillanica Lou Mayvin went and cried her poor little eyes out after her first public execution and then disappeared. Magillanica was dead— Magillanica died a long time ago a soft, useless little girl with too many emotions for this world. 

In this age, you kind of needed to kill to survive. An old assassin’s guild out the way taught her that right off the bat after saving her from near death just outside the castle gates. They cared for her a lot back in those days, teaching her how to make her artes useful in combat, steadying her soul and her resolve. After a while, run-ins with the guards and the royals got too risky when her artes grew too powerful to pass off as just any old kid, so she left and wandered to Hyland instead. She only regretted that she couldn’t pay them back more other than bloodying her hands a little along her journeys and paying tribute.

Velvet pulled the knife out once the guy was definitively dead and cleaned it off on the grass. "Bra _vo_ ," Magilou said with a low whistle, her soft clap ringing through the trees. "Guess I owe you one, then."

"No, not really," Velvet replied with a huff of breath, releasing the pent up adrenaline. 

"Oh, just let me pay you back for once," Magilou said, rolling up the picnic blanket clumsily as if nothing happened. "Next date on me? It might be a while, though, since I’m still short on—"

"I do things for myself, if I haven’t made it clear," Velvet said. She sheathed her knife and looked straight at Magilou. "So you don’t owe me anything."

"I did ask, though," said Magilou, and Velvet shook her head.

"When someone punches you, you go ow," she said, stalking toward Magilou until they were eye to eye. 

Magilou raised her eyebrow cautiously, willing her shoulders down as if her heart weren’t threatening to race out of her chest. Not that Velvet felt like danger, otherwise Magilou’s body would’ve instinctively backed away. It was more the kind of feeling that you were about to hear something you needed to know yet didn’t want to hear. You knew it was coming, and the anticipation felt worse than the blow itself. 

"I made the decision to 'protect you' on my own, and I would make it again," said Velvet, her fingers coming to cup Magilou’s chin in a surprisingly gentle motion. Magilou’s own hand reflexively whipped up and grabbed Velvet’s wrist, movements disintegrating into those of a wild animal pushed out of their comfort zone. Not that Velvet didn’t already know what she was doing to Magilou— though if she actually didn’t know, she probably wouldn’t have acted any differently. Magilou was beginning to understand Velvet a little better. "Don’t think I’m 'tolerating' you just to get something out of you," Velvet continued, right up against Magilou’s lips. Magilou sucked in a breath. "I’m actually rather enjoying my time. And I have confidence in my taste in people. It’s insulting that you would doubt that."

Their kiss was devoid of anything unromantic. It was, in effect, completely romantic. Velvet was forceful, but she was trying— if she was a bad kisser, it meant that all her other cheesy lines from before were… genuine. Not that Magilou ever doubted that, knowing Velvet. That was why they were still here in this clearing in the first place: because neither of them could tolerate anyone else, and no one else could quite tolerate them either. That was essentially how Velvet-And-Magilou came to be.

—

Not long after, Magilou moved into Velvet’s place, and the old lady landlord had to find a new person to buy her groceries. The old lady was half senile and kept calling Magilou "Mayvin" every time she saw her despite Magilou not having spoken a word about her family. This time, when Magilou said she was moving out, the old lady told her good luck with her new girlfriend and to visit from time to time, despite Velvet never having visited Magilou’s apartment. 

Magilou abandoned the concept of owning personal belongings a while ago when she left the assassin’s guild. Apparently, so did Velvet: her home was gut-wrenchingly spartan, aside from the bare necessities— a bed, a table, cooking supplies, a stove, a few hangers in the closet, and a single lantern that sat on top of a small stack of books near her bed. "This place needs more personality," Magilou announced, and Velvet hummed from the kitchen.

"I’ll keep that in mind for when we can afford it," she said, and Magilou whistled. 

"It’s just a shame," sang Magilou, sitting down in the middle of the floor for lack of even a chair or a couch. "You, Velvet, have so much of it! I hate to see a beautiful space go to waste."

So the first thing they bought was a new mattress because there were only so many ways Magilou could contort herself to fit into a twin-sized bed with Velvet until she couldn’t sleep anymore. Velvet was the kind of person who pretty much demonstrated exactly what it was supposed to look like to fall asleep: her shoulders drooped and every muscle in her body seemed to relax and slide back into their natural curves. Magilou traced them with her eyes until she was falling asleep too, mesmerized by how soft Velvet was under her attire and the mess of black hair. It was almost motherly, and there was no feeling quite as safe as that in Magilou’s recent memory: how sometimes, being held in soft, loving arms felt safer than all the shields and swords and knights in the world. 

Despite all this, Magilou often woke up facing the wall with Velvet spooned up against her back, her arms wrapped so tight around her she could barely breathe. "Velvet, dear," Magilou choked out one morning at 3AM, "Velvet, you’re—"

Velvet jolted herself awake and pulled back instantly. "I’m sorry," she gulped out, looking oddly vulnerable.

Magilou coughed out everything stuck in her throat and waved it off. "Oh, you know. The Great Magilou might be more durable than she looks, but she's not _immortal_."

It was early morning, too early even to tell that it was morning, when nothing was awake and time seemed to stop for a while. Velvet’s hand trembled a little when she put it back on Magilou’s hip as if careful not to break her, which was curious, because Velvet could be so rough sometimes, with every intention of stripping the world of all unnecessary fluff. "I’m just afraid I’ll lose you," Velvet blurted out, her voice hoarse but loud in the silence. Apparently she got straight to the point in moments like these, too; there was no lead-in, no warning that Magilou was about to be hit with a confession too big to handle. 

Magilou blinked for a moment and then forced out a laugh because she didn’t know how else to respond. "You can’t get rid of me that easily, sweet pea."

Velvet looked down as if Magilou hadn’t said anything at all. "Like, I’m afraid you’ll run off in the middle of the night," Velvet mumbled. Her voice was harsh, almost accusatory, as if she didn’t know how to differentiate between anger and despair and it all came out sounding the same.

"Now, give me one solid reason that would be a good idea," Magilou said, tapping Velvet’s cheek. "Where would I go? What would I _eat_? No one makes comfort food quite like you, you know."

But that only seemed to make Velvet fold in on herself even more, which cracked a little the icy wall around Magilou’s heart. "What am I to you?" Velvet whispered after a while.

"Why, everything!" Magilou replied with a frantic grin, sitting up so that the covers fell around her waist. "Food, shelter, the works. I don’t know where I’d be without you, you know. I mean, back at that—"

Velvet then suddenly pushed Magilou down by her shoulders so that she was hovering over her, black hair falling around Magilou’s face like a curtain blanketing out the rest of the world. "No, I mean," Velvet said lowly, "What would I be if I didn’t have all this? Forget the food, forget the stability. You don’t even like that, anyway."

Magilou stared at Velvet until she couldn’t anymore, her mouth drawing into a thin line as she finally looked away. "At least you know that," Magilou said quietly.

"What?" said Velvet, leaning in.

Magilou sighed. "That I don’t like stability. That I don’t make promises, dear," she said, bringing her hand up to reach into Velvet’s hair, not feeling for anything in particular but more to ground herself. She didn’t push Velvet away, though. "I can’t."

Velvet seemed to soften visibly then, her grip on Magilou’s shoulder loosening. She leaned down and buried her face into the crook of Magilou’s neck, leaving soft kisses against her jawline. Her fringe tickled Magilou’s chin and lips, and Magilou nibbled on it a bit, twirling some stray strands around her finger and tilting her head just the slightest to give Velvet a bit more room. 

"Don’t know how," Magilou continued, closing her eyes and wrapping her arms around Velvet’s neck. "Never learned."

"You know," Velvet mumbled into Magilou’s skin, "I don’t think I’ll ever be able to leave you."

Magilou snorted gently, carding through Velvet’s hair.

"But I don’t want to hold you back," Velvet continued.

"On the contrary," Magilou replied. "Velvet, love, I think it’s pretty obvious you make me better."

Velvet sighed, her breath tickling Magilou’s skin, and Magilou shivered. She felt pliant whenever Velvet did that, and Velvet seemed to catch on to this, effortlessly flipping them over so that Magilou was sitting on her abdomen, straddling her hips. "You just don’t get it, do you?" she said, but her voice was fond.

"Oh, that’s a bit harsh, don’t you think?" Magilou said, giggling when Velvet tickled her waist. 

"Two things," murmured Velvet, pulling Magilou down so that she was hovering over Velvet’s lips. Magilou gasped, laughing breathlessly and pushing against Velvet’s grip to peck her lightly. "If you ever stop loving me, please leave."

"Roger," Magilou replied, and Velvet laughed as if she knew Magilou didn’t mean it. After all, Magilou couldn't make promises, even if they were promises to leave. "What’s the second?"

"Tell me you love me," Velvet said.

Magilou opened her mouth to speak. "I—" she started, but the rest of the words seemed to get caught in her throat. The silence between them then felt both ominous and thrilling, which was exactly Magilou. It was a simple enough request, but something about Velvet waiting for her, hands on her hips and staring at her like Magilou was her entire world, made everything spin really slow. It was like in those dreams where you were trying to run away from something but for some reason, you couldn’t lift your legs at all. 

After a moment, Velvet brushed the backs of her fingers against Magilou’s cheek. "I’m sorry," she said, her gaze genuine. "I— I’m sorry, that was really— you don’t have to right now if—"

Magilou breathed in dramatically, shaking the fog out of her head as if it ever totally left. There were a lot of things that had been demanded of her over the years, and Magilou wasn’t some incompetent wimp even though sometimes when they were alone and Velvet patiently, steadily peeled off all Magilou’s carefully stitched layers, it felt like there were parts of her deep down that were _so_ frustratingly wimpy. And it always happened at the least convenient times, in response to the simplest, most straightforward requests. Magilou planted a big, sloppy kiss right on Velvet’s lips. "You know I love you, boo," she said, her voice pitching up into a bright squeal.

It wasn’t until Velvet touched Magilou’s face again with a ghost of a smile that Magilou felt her own tears. And if Velvet was busy wiping them away, she didn’t say anything. "That’s good enough," Velvet said tenderly, and Magilou gave her a half-smile that probably looked a lot sadder than she felt inside. 

Being around Velvet was this weird kind of uncomfortable that was both unfamiliar— _emotional_ deep down, but on a completely superficial level the thrill of it left Magilou coming back for more. Velvet would get you— if anything, she was persistent like a brick in a world of feathers. Velvet had the kind of control over her life that Magilou never knew and eventually just gave up wanting somewhere along the line. But being around Velvet was making it all come back in a way that Magilou wasn’t sure she was ready to handle, but every time it came up, it felt like lifting off a big weight you never knew was even there. There was something so human, so real about Velvet that it began to seep into Magilou too, whether she liked it or not.

—

The next time they went out was to go grocery shopping together because Velvet kept buying this wacky sourdough bread with herbs and asiago baked into the crust and Magilou just wanted some simple, buttery sweet rolls. "You're so unpredictable," Velvet said for the umpteenth time, shaking her head.

"That's me," Magilou replied, skipping alongside her.

"I can never tell what you're gonna like," Velvet admitted. "There's no pleasing you, is there?"

Magilou hummed with her hands behind her head, her neck stretch back a little up toward the sky. "Don't bother trying," she said finally.

"What?" said Velvet, and Magilou grinned.

"Stop trying! Just get whatever you want, and I'll tell you if I don't like it. I mean, if I don't like it, I sure as hell won't eat it."

Velvet looked at her as if she'd suddenly sprouted another eye. "But then I'd have to eat the whole loaf myself."

Magilou shrugged. "So you'd have to eat the whole loaf yourself. Big deal. Can't say I've never wanted to eat an entire loaf of bread in one sitting myself."

Velvet seemed content with this response and dragged Magilou on through the crowd by the bell on her collar as if she'd lose her if she let go. Fair enough, Magilou tended to get distracted easily at the market, which was why she never went grocery shopping herself. The first and only time Velvet entrusted her with the task of buying another jug of milk, Magilou had come back with a live octopus, someone's old revolving spice rack, an almanac from four years ago, and a pair of reading glasses though neither of them were farsighted. Not that there wasn't space in the apartment for it, Magilou just ended up having to pitch in a day of help at the dock to compensate for the rest of the month's groceries. Needless to say, Velvet's boss fired Magilou after the first day, and Velvet forbade her from grocery shopping.

Velvet tugged Magilou close suddenly in broad daylight. "Something's coming," Velvet murmured. "Stay close."

Magilou rolled her eyes. "For the record, I'm perfectly capable of protecting myself. I only humor you because I do appreciate—"

She was cut off by a sylphjay barreling into her hat, nearly knocking it off her head. It somehow seemed to slow down and perch right in the crook of the brim. Velvet snorted at first, then her whole face crinkled up as she tried to hold her laughter in.

Magilou glared at her and shrugged. "Go ahead, laugh."

So Velvet did, a big chortle bubbling out from her throat like a rushing river. In truth, Magilou kind of loved hearing Velvet’s laugh; it was pretty and had a lot of depth and body to it and it felt both vulnerable and strong. 

A man with blonde hair and a scraggly tricorne came running up to them. Out of breath, he stammered, "S-sorry about that. We sometimes send sylphjays out to look for new trainers, but we didn’t think he’d fly this far out!"

Magilou waved him off, but Velvet hummed. "New trainers, you say?"

The blonde man nodded. "Some people are more attuned to them than others, and only the sylphjays themselves can tell."

A few birds peeped out of his hat and chirped at Magilou, and the bird in Magilou’s hat squawked back, seeming obstinate on settling in for life. 

"Have you worked with animals before, miss?" the man said to Magilou.

"Magilou is fine, and no, I usually detest the little rascals," Magilou replied. "So fickle and unpredictable."

"In other words, kind of like you," Velvet said, and Magilou frowned, but Velvet wasn’t wrong. 

"You should give it a shot," continued Velvet over dinner that evening, and Magilou twirled her fork in front of her face and stared at the string bean impaled on it, crossing her eyes. "I think you’d be good at it."

The man’s name was Benwick and he headed a sylphjay training facility based somewhere in Ladylake. Magilou couldn’t find success in other jobs and was perfectly content with leeching off of Velvet’s living situation until Velvet got tired of her. But it had been several months and that showed no sign of happening, and Magilou was starting to get antsy staying in one place for so long. Velvet was becoming a permanent fixture in her life, and though she loathed to admit it, it was kind of nice. It was too early to call it true love, but leaving Velvet was out of the question, so a job did seem like the next logical step. 

Magilou wasn’t logical, but becoming a sylphjay trainer wasn’t something she ever could’ve predicted happening. A coin toss also told her not to do it. Thus, it was something she absolutely had to do. That was the essence of Magilou. If you thought about it too hard, it would just make your brain hurt. 

"Oh? They’re doing a Sacred Blade ceremony this year to boost morale," Velvet said the next morning, watching people rush by toward the church from a small window in their kitchen. 

"I was under the impression that life was pretty good," Magilou replied.

Velvet sighed and laughed lightly. "Only you would say that under these living conditions. Besides, the daemonblight and all." 

Magilou shrugged. "Eh, it is what it is. If you ever become infected, I’ll be sure to run away at once."

"I’d rather be slaughtered immediately, but I can’t even complain," Velvet said, waving it off and hanging her apron on the hook by the doorway. "That’s so very like you."

Magilou grinned in response. As bitter as she could get about the past sometimes, the future was almost never something she worried herself about. When everything was as inherently chaotic as it was, there was just no point. 

"I’m gonna check it out anyway during lunch break," Velvet said. "Who knows, might get a shepherd this year."

"I wouldn’t count on it," said Magilou.

Velvet laughed. "I don’t count on anything, but I’ve taken a liking to interesting happenings lately. Wanna join me?"

"Can’t," Magilou replied, and Velvet tilted her head in curiosity, noting under her breath that it _was_ unusual for Magilou to be up and about this early, especially after a late night and some great sex. Velvet fucked her with a strap-on yesterday and then Magilou rode her until they both came again, and they were almost too tired and wobbly-legged to even clean up afterward. "I have to make a good impression on my first day at work, after all."

Velvet hummed, as if Magilou heading off to work weren’t news to her at all. That was one thing Magilou loved about Velvet; she was rarely surprised by anything these days, and if she was, she didn’t show it. "You don’t seem like the type to care about first impressions, though," Velvet said as they waltzed out the door together, not bothering to even lock it because it wasn’t like they had anything worth stealing. Velvet always locked it when Magilou was home alone, though, though she didn’t know Magilou noticed. 

"Good," said Magilou, and Velvet laughed.

**Author's Note:**

> i literally don't know why i wrote this :^) i just really like magivel a lot and i want them 2 have a happy and peaceful life together where they do cute domestic things and bother each other and love each other a lot kdjfhk


End file.
